


The Drones

by lasergirl



Category: Jeeves and Wooster, Stiff Upper Lips (1998)
Genre: Crossover, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-04-02
Updated: 2010-04-02
Packaged: 2017-10-08 15:50:33
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,179
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/77250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lasergirl/pseuds/lasergirl





	The Drones

_**The Drones (Part 1/?)**_  
**Title:** The Drones  
**Fandom:** Jeeves and Wooster / Stiff Upper Lips crossover  
**Rating:** PG/NC-17  
**Pairing:** Bertie Wooster/Edward Ivory  
**Notes:** It was bound to happen. Together, they have the intellect of a backwards clam.

  
PART ONE

My club is a rather particular sort of club for a rather particular sort of people; its staples are those of consistency and routine, and one would risk expulsion should one go against the rules. It's a simple affair, for those young gentlemen of ease and a bit of dosh, where one can go and just be oneself without any fear of having to indulge someone in a fit of something awfully dull, like politics or philosophy. It is a rather exclusive little deal, though on the whole it's a rather different sort of evening than, say, a box seat at the opera or a rail at the races. For example, at The Drones you'd never have to worry about being drawn into a feverish debate over the translation of Latin conjugates, and certainly would never have to worry about anything greater than what wine to have with supper.

It would do no good to introduce great brains into this idyllic paradise without disrupting the natural order of things, and so things continue much the same from day to day. On a good day, I could get in several rounds of darts, a couple of scotch and s before afternoon tea and maybe even a good hard run of card-tossing before I could well and truly exhaust the old intellect.

When I say 'particular,' I should stress that we don't take just any dashing thing in off the street, no, one must have a certain _je ne sais quoi_, a _laissez-faire_, and plenty of the old argent never hurts either. Several of the unfortunates are quite heavily married, to the detriment of all, for these skulking chappies do tend to bring the conversation around to the mysterious and age-old question of Women more often than seems fit. Infinitely dull, those poor blighters, and once they hitch themselves to the carriage it's really only a matter of time before they give in to the yoke and whip completely. Why, there are fellows from Drones who I wouldn't recognize on the street when they have a woman on their arm - the demeanour changes entirely, the sparkle is extinguished from the eye, the spring banished from the step. They shuffle along with the old ball and chain like a poor man to the gallows, and you'd never notice if they didn't once in a while draw breath and say "What ho, Bertie old chap, it's a marvel to see you again!"

Yes, rummy thing, marriage. I've been engaged once or twice myself but it doesn't suit me. I could never stand the thought of having to stick it out til 'death do us part' and all that. The whole sitch sends shivers down my spine. Give me the Drones and a scotch and soda any day of the week.

But this is all beside the real point, that is to say, it's a rather particular sort of gathering. We're all quite chummy; we're old school chums or friends of families or Lords of something-or-others, but we're all Drones. Once in a while, though, there's a trickle of fresh blood, a sort of infusion to replace those dearly departeds. It's always a proper bash with plenty of wine and song, to sort of ease the new fellows in without scaring them off. You know how these newcomers tend to be a timid lot until they're properly annointed.

On this particular occasion it was the middle of October, slap-bang in the centre of a grey and quite dreary month, and with only two weeks until the big Hallowe'en bash, the newest members were creeping around the confines and sniffing the air with all of the bravery of wild rabbits.

One specific rabbit was all alone, a curly-headed blond chap, looking rather dashing in the old white tie and t. It pains me to see a new fellow standing painfully aside, so I do what I can to generate a little warmth for him. I trickled over and offered a flute of bubbly to break the ice.

"Fancy a belt?" Up close, his eyes could only best be described as 'a stunning auzure' though I'm sure the old W S would have had a better turn for it, him being a poet and all.

"Eh?" The fellow smiled a rather vague little one and took the glass. "Awfully decent of you. Who did you say you were?"

"Well, I haven't yet. I mean, I was about to exchange the usual pleasantries but hadn't quite. Wooster, old chap, Bertie Wooster." This came with the patent handshake and the rakish grin. No sense in sparing the old Wooster family charm, even on young game like this.

"Edward Ivory," said the fellow, shaking my hand with soft, damp mitt. He peered closer and wrinkled his pale brow. "I say, you do look terribly familiar, have we met before? A poetry reading perhaps?"

The old bean twinged at the very thought of a flock of nervous, over-excited poets, flapping their hands about or reading lugubriously from thick tomes. From what I knew of poetry it was either dashed difficult to understand, or everything rhymed and came out farily dirty in the end. I preferred the latter to the former, but it didn't change my idea of poetry very much.

"I once went to a lecture on Homer given by a barmy old coot, trying to please a girl, don't you know, but it all ended rather badly." But this rememberance sent the rusty cogs a-churning in the Wooster bean and I knew I recognized this Ivory chap.

"I say, old fellow, you wouldn't by any chance be a school chum of Cedric Trilling? Dark, severe-looking chappie, rather a penchant for the Greeks?"

"Old Cedders?" There was a sparkle in his eye when he said the name, though it soon died away into a slow, mournful pout. "Rather, we went up together, and afterwards we did a great deal of travelling. I don't see the old fellow much anymore I'm afraid."

The Trilling creature, this Cedders, I remembered as a nasty breed of intellectual, the worst sort, always pushing his nose into other people's books and spouting the vilest verses imaginable. His Latin was impeccable, though, and his Greek divine, but that was no compensation for such sins.

"Well, have a snootfull of that," I raised my own glass in an attempt to bring that shy smile back onto his lips, "and buck up. Time waits for no man and all that."

"Indeed," and there crept that little ghost of a smile onto his pale pink lips. "I shall endeavour to enjoy myself, Wooster. It is, after all, a party."

"Call me Bertie, old chap," I offered gallantly, "And let me show you the Games Room. The new chappies always get a rise out of it."  


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